What a Good Product Engagement Score Looks Like and How to Raise Yours

If you've ever stared at a usage dashboard thinking, "Cool... and now what?" you're in good company. B2B teams track everything – logins, feature clicks, session duration – and still get blindsided when accounts don't renew.

Product Engagement Score (PES) promises one tidy number for adoption, stickiness, and growth. It's concrete enough for executives and board reporting, and useful for spotting trends over time. But although composite scores shine for quarterly comparisons, they rarely tell your customer success team which 20 accounts need a call this week.

In this guide, you'll learn what a good PES looks like for B2B SaaS, how to calculate it step-by-step using the industry-standard formula, and how to use it for more than board decks, to actually retain and grow accounts. You'll also see where standard PES falls short, and what B2B teams actually need when deciding who gets attention today.

What product engagement score tells you (and what it doesn't)

What is a PES score?

Product Engagement Score is a composite metric that averages adoption, stickiness, and growth, all normalized on a 0–100 scale. You measure each component separately, scale them to 0–100, add them up, then divide by three.

That normalization is what makes PES useful. A score of 68 in Q1 means the same thing as 68 in Q4, even if you've shipped new features or doubled your user base. By default, PES treats all core features equally when calculating adoption breadth, which is helpful, but also a limitation we'll come back to. You can download the calculator template with pre-built formulas to start tracking right away.

What are the main business benefits of tracking a Product Engagement Score?

PES is great at telling you what changed – your score dropped from 72 to 65 last month – but it's not great at telling you why, or what to do next. That makes it ideal for trend tracking and reports, but less helpful when a CSM has 50 accounts to triage before quarter-end.

In B2B, account-level PES is where things get real. A company-wide score of 75 can hide one power user at 95 covering for five dormant teammates at 20. That's how renewals sneak up on you. As a rule of thumb, treat 60% as your "we should probably talk" line – accounts below it are your biggest retention opportunities.

How to break down the three core components of a Product Engagement Score

There are several components when it comes to making sense of your Product Engagement Score. Each one points to a different engagement issue:

• Adoption shows the percentage of defined core features users engage with during the measurement period. Low adoption usually signals discovery problems – features users don't know about, can't find, or don't understand.

• Stickiness measures return usage, typically DAU divided by MAU for B2B products. Low stickiness means habits aren't forming. Users tried the product, but it never became part of their regular workflow.

• Growth uses the Quick Ratio: new users plus recovered users, divided by dropped users, then mapped to 0–100. A Quick Ratio below 1.0 means you're losing more users than you're gaining, which shows up as a growth score under 50.

Together, this breakdown turns PES from a blunt health signal into something you can actually diagnose and act on.

How is a Product Engagement Score different from other metrics like Net Promoter Score?

Net Promoter Score (NPS) and Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT) measure sentiment through surveys – how users feel about your product. Basic usage metrics like logins or page views can mislead, since activity doesn't guarantee value. Sometimes users are just clicking around, stuck.

PES focuses on behavior and standardizes it so you can compare performance across timeframes and products. It tracks what users actually do, not what they say. That's also what separates PES from Customer Engagement Score, which blends in email opens, community activity, and support tickets. PES looks only at in-product feature usage.

That narrow focus is its strength. In B2B, users can dislike your product and still renew if it solves a critical problem. Behavior is a better predictor of retention than sentiment.

How to calculate your product engagement score

The industry-standard approach boils down to three formulas:

Adoption

The number of core events users engage with, divided by total core events available, ×100.

Define 15 core events, the average user hits 10 → 67% adoption.

Stickiness

Daily Active Users ÷ Monthly Active Users, ×100 (use WAU/MAU for weekly products).

200 MAU, 50 DAU → 25% stickiness.

Growth

Measured with the Quick Ratio: (new users + recovered users) ÷ dropped users, then mapped to a 0–100 scale where 0.5 = 0, 1.5 = 50, and 5.0 = 100.

Add the three scores and divide by three.

Adoption 67, stickiness 25, growth 63 → Product Engagement Score: 52

A simple, step-by-step example of calculating a PES for a fictional app

Here's a complete walkthrough for a fictional project management tool:

Track these metrics daily, but calculate PES monthly to match B2B business cycles. This monthly rhythm spots real trends without daily noise. Download our calculator template with these formulas pre-built.

Choosing core events that reflect real value

Core event choice can quietly wreck your PES. Common pitfalls include:

Admin-only events

Billing or user management drags adoption down because most users never touch them. Count "Add team member" as core, and individual contributors look disengaged, even when they're heavy users.

Navigation events

Menu clicks and page views inflate scores without proving value. If "View settings page" counts, confused users look productive.

One-time setup events

Account creation and profile setup skew results. New users spike early, long-term customers dip later, despite steady usage.

Choose events that show real work getting done. "Published project update" or "Generated client report" signal genuine value. Standard PES weights all core events equally, so every choice matters.

Choosing your stickiness ratio

Most B2B products should default to DAU/MAU.

DAU/MAU

Best for episodic tools like analytics or planning software. It captures natural bursts of activity without punishing quiet periods.

WAU/MAU

A solid middle ground when weekly rhythms matter e.g. Monday planning tools or platforms with weekly reviews.

DAU/WAU

Usually, the wrong fit. For weekly-use products, it's noisy and misleading. An 80% WAU/MAU rate becomes just 11% DAU/WAU, triggering panic where none is needed.

Turn noisy engagement data into clear next steps

Accoil strips out misleading signals and surfaces the handful of behaviours that actually predict retention. No complex scoring models – just clear answers on which accounts need attention now.

See how Accoil helps predict renewals and prevent churn

Reading the numbers and raising your score

What is considered a good benchmark for a product engagement score?

For most B2B SaaS products, a Product Engagement Score (PES) in the 70–80% range signals healthy engagement. 80%+ points to strong product-market fit. Below 60% is your cue to dig in.

• 70–80%: Users adopt core features, return regularly, and your base grows at a steady clip. This is the healthy middle ground where many successful B2B products land.

• 80%+: Clear product-market fit. Deep feature adoption, consistent growth, and your product is part of daily workflows.

• Below 60%: Time to investigate. Onboarding gaps, weak value delivery, or a product-market fit issue is likely lurking.

Focus on your own trend line, not vanity comparisons. A move from 68% in Q1 to 72% in Q2 matters more than a competitor sitting at 75%.

How to read PES components to diagnose engagement problems

Your headline PES tells you something's off. The components tell you what to fix.

• Low adoption: Users aren't discovering key features, or onboarding isn't doing its job. If adoption is 40% while stickiness and growth look fine, users return often but only use a narrow slice of the product.

• Low stickiness: Habits aren't forming. In B2B tools, stickiness under 20% usually means the product is seen as "occasionally useful," not essential.

• Low growth: You're losing users faster than you're adding them. A Quick Ratio below 1.0 (growth score under 50) signals a shrinking base, often months before revenue feels it.

Segment by lifecycle stage, role, plan tier, tenure, and last active date to surface risks averages hide. Trials scoring 85% while paid users sit at 55% usually means strong activation and weak long-term value.

What are some actionable strategies for improving a low product engagement score?

Match the fix to the problem:

• For adoption: Guide new users to high-value features in their first session based on role, not generic tours. If adoption is 45%, study what power users touch first and surface those same features to similar new users.

• For stickiness: Use timely nudges to introduce advanced features after users master the basics. If stickiness is around 15%, look for moments right after a successful workflow to deepen engagement.

• For growth: Remove friction in key workflows and re-engage users who've gone quiet. When growth drops below 40, start with win-back sequences for anyone inactive for 14+ days.

Study your power users closely. The 90%+ crowd often discovers non-obvious feature combinations that others never find.

How can I use the Product Engagement Score to inform my product roadmap decisions?

PES turns roadmap debates into data-backed calls:

• Track PES after releases to see whether features help or hinder. A drop from 74% to 68% suggests confusion; a rise to 79% signals validation.

• Segment low-growth cohorts to spot gaps. If enterprise users sit at 78% while starter plans lag at 52%, you've either over-built for big teams or under-explained value to smaller ones.

• Identify Product-Qualified Leads by tracking trial users with 70%+ adoption. Broad exploration predicts conversion better than stickiness alone.

• Measure Time to PQL and PQL-to-Paid Conversion Rate to tie engagement directly to revenue – and give onboarding clear targets to optimize.

How B2B teams move from standard PES to weighted account scoring

Where standard PES breaks down

Company-wide PES gives execs a tidy number for reporting, but leaves CSMs guessing which 20 accounts actually need attention today. A 68 score can quietly bundle accounts at 30 (churn risk) with those cruising at 90 (ripe for expansion). The averages look calm; the reality isn't.

Standard PES also treats every feature the same. A daily login counts as much as completing your highest-value workflow, so low-impact activity can drown out the signals that really matter for retention and growth. Result: blind spots where churn prevention and expansion should be obvious.

And for early-stage teams, enterprise tools that take weeks to implement and require dedicated CS Ops just aren't realistic.

How Accoil moves beyond standard PES

Accoil borrows from hard-earned experience scaling B2B SaaS. The founders previously built ThinkTilt (acquired by Atlassian) and deliberately avoided the usual playbook.

Instead of equal weighting, Accoil lets you weight features by business importance. Logins might earn 1 point (baseline usage), while inviting a teammate earns 10 (real adoption). The score reflects what actually drives retention.

Active User Percentage adds another layer, tracking seat usage to flag accounts using 10 of 50 licenses ahead of renewal. It catches the classic "single champion" problem of having one power user keeping the lights on while everyone else stays inactive.

Focus your team on the accounts that matter most

Accoil replaces misleading averages with weighted signals, so CSMs know exactly which accounts need attention today, and why.

See how weighted scoring works in Accoil

How to use Accoil with other tools

Product teams lean on tools like Pendo or Mixpanel to explore behavior and calculate standard PES. Revenue teams need something simpler and more direct: clear, weighted signals pushed straight into Slack and the CRM.

Pendo, Mixpanel, and Amplitude are great at deep analysis with equal weighting. Accoil sits on top of that data, turning it into weighted account scores without you having to replace your stack. It operationalizes what you already collect.

Connect via Segment, RudderStack, or direct API, and get real insights flowing to your team in under 24 hours. Pricing is transparent and usage-based, starting at $50/month, with no annual contract and a 30-day trial.

Getting from PES percentage to prioritized account actions

A daily feed surfaces clear signals like: "Account X usage dropped 20%; key champion hasn't logged in for 14 days," or "Account Y hit its storage limit." Each alert comes with automated Salesforce tasks, so CSMs know exactly what to do next.

Every weighted score is fully explainable. You can drill down to see which behaviors moved the number, fixing the black-box problem. If a score drops from 75 to 62, you'll know it was driven by three users going dormant.

Scores sync to Salesforce or HubSpot to trigger workflows automatically – drop below 60, and a "save account" task fires. Setup includes ready-made scoring workspaces with customizable feature weights mapped to common B2B SaaS patterns.

Moving to weighted account scoring

So, now you know what PES measures, what a good score looks like, how to calculate it properly, and where it falls down when you're deciding who actually needs help today.

PES shines as a board-level metric. That neat 72 works well in quarterly reviews and exec updates. But when your customer success team has 50 accounts to triage ahead of renewals, it starts to wobble. The equal weighting that keeps PES simple also makes it blunt for day-to-day decisions.

Weighted account-level scoring fixes that. It assigns real business importance to different features and scores usage at the account level, surfacing retention risks and expansion signals that company-wide averages quietly gloss over.

Move past generic PES and into weighted account scoring that actually improves retention. See how Accoil helps B2B teams turn product usage into clear next actions for customer success, sales, and account management teams.